Tag Archives: T.I.N.A

So you know it already but the This Is Not Art Festival, and more specifically the National Young Writers’ Festival, kicks off this Thursday 30th September til Monday 4th October in Newcastle. I’ve attended the last 3 years, and wrote about last year’s experience here, but I think I’ve filled my quota of zine fairs for 2010 + I’m really tired + I can’t get the time off work. So unfortunately this unholy trifecta (as well as some other inconsequentials) means that the fetus and I won’t be having a Tiny Paper Hearts stall at The Sunday Fair.

But it behooves me to recommend the NYWF program, as there is some plenty interesting stuff being done by plenty interesting people – Bastian Phelan, John Stevens, Leigh Rigozzi, Lisa Dempster and Vanessa Berry to mention a few. Can I also make a couple of musical recommendations? Grouper will be playing as part of the TiNA Showcase gig on the Saturday and kyü will be playing at Soundclash on the Sunday. Both should be excellent shows that I’m pretty bummed at missing (although luckily Grouper’s playing at the Sandringham the following weekend).

Anyways, have an excellent time if you’re heading to Newcastle. Catch you on the flip side.

Ok, so I intended to take all these photos and attend as many panels/workshops/launches as humanly possible and write this huge update about the annual This is Not Art festival in Newcastle but it didn’t quite work out like that. I camped at Tent City, and my tent collapsed every night because of my non-existent camping skills, my camera battery ran out on the second day and I got rained on repeatedly. BUT, I had an amazing time [most of the time].

A couple of the highlights included midnight swimming at the [absolutely freezing] Newcastle baths, the presentation by the Canberra and Sydney Dorkbots, the roundtable at Staple Manor about printing techniques and the Rizzeria, the Totoro’s Tea House Grand Opening on Friday night which featured an amazing lecture on disco called ‘You Can’t Stop the Musing’ by Craig Schuftan…

…and some beautiful musical sets by Maddy and Pip. If you stop by the Tea House I recommend a pot of Earl Grey and Red Flower tea or the fruity iced tea.

The Great Gatsby Ball on Saturday night contained some excellent party times and it was heartwarming to see so many people make the effort to dress up. The Spelling Bee at The View Factory was pretty fun and the Sunday zine fair was, as always, completely packed and non stop selling/trading all day.

Below are our amazing felt doppelgangers made by the fetus!

I always look forward to the fair, it’s wonderful to see so many regular zinemakers turn up and I finally put some faces to the names of people I know from interstate. And there were so many lovely people that I met throughout the festival who also stopped by the table, which was really nice. If you traded or bought our zines, thank you! We’d love to hear from you if you picked up our zines, please let us know what you thought by emailing tinypapermail [at] gmail [dot] com. Or, if you didn’t get to make it to the fair you can always trade by mailing your zine to the address on the right.

And that’s pretty much it. I’m really really really happy to be at home with a proper shower and a warm bed but at the same time incredibly inspired. Although I have to say I think the zinemaking may be on hiatus for a little bit while I recover. Did anyone else catch anything amazing at TiNA?

Well I don’t know about you kids but for me it’s midsemester, which means midsemester essays, which means looking for any excuse to procrastinate.

I’ve been thinking about this particular project for a while as it’s actually the kind of zine that I want to read other people’s versions of. Basically it’s a short list of words, terms and phrases that my closest friends and I use from day to day and where they come from. Most of them are appropriated from popular culture – some of which you’ll recognise, some of which you might not.

A6, 16 pages, black and white

It has also has step by step origami instructions so that, you know, you’re having fun too. There’ll be copies at the This Is Not Art zine fair on Sunday October 4 or, as always, they’re available for trades.

Just in case you didn’t get the email or have already heard about it from excited punters, the zine and craft stall registrations for the 2009 This Is Not Art festival Sunday Fair are now open!

It’s being held on the 4th of October from 12pm-5pm in the new ‘Ghetto Town’ [which is actually a new space on top of the King St carpark] and once again is free for zinemakers! They are also really interested in getting artists, crafters and designers involved as well and there’ll be live music and food on the day as well. The Sunday fair is always a fantastic part of the T.I.N.A. Festival so you should probably, definitely, get involved if you can! The fetus and I will be there with hopefully some new zines and we’re looking forward to some excellent trades.

I just wanted to add my two cents to our experience at T.I.N.A. 2008. I have to say that it was one of the most friendliest, busiest zine fairs I’ve been to since we started last year and I was so glad that we swapped so many zines, with first timers and old hands alike (and a shout out to the lovely girl who traded our zines for a choc-mint vegan cupcake. Delicious!) . We got the inevitable question about ‘What are zines’ and I don’t know about the fetus but I was at a bit of a loss how to answer it. One of the most important parts of understanding zines is to first open and read them. When we got home from T.I.N.A. on Sunday night I couldn’t help but start reading the ones that we had traded, exhaustion be damned. There was an amazing mix – perzines, political zines, poems, comics, graphic zines, university publications and collective magazines. One of the best parts of trading zines is that a connection is formed between you and the writer/illustrator/poet, encouraging you to think about your own writing/drawing in a completely non-competitive way. Reading through these zines, I didn’t feel depressed about my own writing or intimidated by people who been making zines for longer – I felt motivated to improve my zines and happy in the knowledge that when I make the next issue there will be people willing to trade.

After only getting an hours sleep the night before T.I.N.A Zine Fair I’m pretty happy to be writing this blog the day after it, in bed, somewhat rested. The zine fair was pretty amazing, so many zines and zine makers! We had a really busy day and between Amanda and I we sold and traded over 100 zines! So thank you to all who came and traded and bought our zines it was a really great day.

If you would like to trade zines with us or write to us you can send mail to:Tiny paper hearts
P.O. Box 392
NEWTOWN, 2042
NSW, AUSTRALIA